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It's a 1924 Martin 00-28, and it has suffered a classic
injury. This guitar fell forward from a guitar stand, landing face down
on a carpeted floor. The inertia of the fall was great enough to snap and
shatter the peghead between the nut and the first row of tuners. |
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The break followed the grain through the heavy carved volute
behind the nut. |
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And, as you can see, the break was more than a single fracture. |
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I made myself a flat acrylic clamping caul for the back
of the peghead, so I'd be able to press the pieces back into alignment.
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This is a little cork block I carved roughly to fit the
volute, so I could clamp right on it without crushing the delicate point
or contours. |
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Hide glue is the stuff if you're worried about heat exposure,
and I'm always worried about heat exposure. No one intends to leave a guitar
in a hot parked car, but, "that day, I really had no choice. . ."
So, hide glue was my choice for this job. The hot breath from my small hair
dryer warmed the pieces so I'd have more time to clamp up before the glue
started to gel. |
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If I'm working with yellow carpenter wood glue, I'll typically
slather the stuff on the wood and then start looking around for clamps
and cauls. Here, though, every second counts, so I had all my supplies
right at hand and had "dry-fitted" the whole thing first to
make sure I'd be able to clamp it in time. (It really is that critical
to get hide glue clamped before it starts to cool below 90 degrees Fahrenheit.
The flat cauls assured perfect front-to-back alignment of the pieces.
I was lucky that the pieces fit together well, and didn't tend to slide
sideways when I clamped them. If they had wanted to slide sideways, I
would have added some clamps and cauls in that dimension, too.
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Next day, I took off the clamps, washed off the excess
glue with warm water and did just a bit of French polishing to renew and
add a tiny bit to the original shellac finish. |
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Good as new? Well, almost. |
